p. 101 | Review and Herald, Vol. 42, No. 13. (9/9/1873)

Michigan Camp-Meeting.

By J. H. W.

On account of the condition of the work in the REVIEW Office, I did not have the privilege of attending the whole of the camp-meeting. But I can bring a good report of it. After the first day, the weather, though sometimes rather cold, was favorable, except Sunday forenoon. Nearly seventy tents were erected, and still there was a lack of room. Two large tents were quite fully occupied for lodging. The order was, as usual, good. The circle for tents was enlarged from last year, and all was well arranged and very neat in appearance.

Testimony No. 23, to the Laodiceans, was brought on the ground the second day of the meeting, and the preaching of Bro. Butler and Haskell was well suited to the occasion, and to the condition of the people. It seemed that the Lord gave them especial freedom and power to proclaim the solemn truths of the message, and to reach the hearts of the people. Though there was not that general hearty public response which was needed to make the meeting as interesting and profitable as was desired, yet it was evident that the hearts of the most were touched, and much good was done for the cause in Michigan. Many pointed and timely testimonies were given, such as brought freedom to the meeting and relief to the souls of those who offered them. This was especially the case in regard to the subject of murmurings, as presented in Resolution number 3. A remark by Bro. Brownsberger well expressed the truth on this point. He said that he was not much acquainted with the facts as they existed, and did not know much about the murmurings referred to, but he found that every confession of this sin brought tears to his eyes, from which he judged that the Spirit of God witnessed to such confessions. Others could testify to the same thing. Indeed, it was evident that this is the point of special importance at this time, as it was the only one that gave life and energy to our social meetings.

In regard to the third resolution it will be well to say that it was adopted by a very general vote; and it is to be hoped that those who did not act upon it in the meeting just closed will consider the duty they took upon themselves in that vote, and see that the “thorough individual confessions” there inculcated be made as soon as possible in their several churches. If it be true that this spirit of murmuring has grieved the Spirit of God, and is largely the cause of our lukewarm state, as the Testimonies teach and as is believed by all who have watched and examined the matter with care, then it must be that we can only rise and go forward in the light and power of the present truth by heartily confessing the past and thoroughly reforming in the future. I would say, individually, that this is my most firm conviction, and, unfortunately for my own past spirituality, I speak from experience.

Most of those who attended this meeting remained over Monday. This was an encouraging feature, as that was, in some respects, the most important day of the meeting. I heard no disappointment expressed; but, to the contrary, it was generally said that this was one of the best camp-meetings, if not the best one, that has been held in the State.

The business meetings of the State Conference were harmonious, and the business transactions gave much promise of good to the cause. The work is being more firmly established in every respect, and it is surely growing in the confidence of the people. Nothing but a sense of our own dependence, and a due acknowledgment of the hand of God in the work, and properly humbling ourselves before him in view of the past, is lacking to raise us from our lukewarm state, to restore to us the joy of God’s salvation, and insure the going forth of the third angel’s message with mighty power. May God speed the day when the “little flock” shall so have “the testimony of Christ confirmed among” them that they shall indeed be “the light of the world,” and that their testimony to the world shall move the hearts of the people, that God may be glorified in his truth. J. H. W.

Tract and Missionary Societies.

By George I. Butler

THE importance of these societies to the advancement of the cause of present truth is being demonstrated more and more clearly every week as we hold camp-meetings in the several States. Not only has a great and good work been done in circulating our publications and in obtaining subscribers for our periodicals, but the influence of these societies is being felt in raising means for the cause. The paying up of delinquencies on the subscription lists in nearly all the Conferences is almost an accomplished fact through their agency. This was thought to be a great matter by many at one time, and had it not been for their organization, it might indeed have proved so. But it has been a small matter comparatively through this means. From this we can see very easily what may be done when they are brought into working order. They serve as educators to the rank and file in the true spirit of sacrifice as illustrated in the case of the New England Conference, as I wrote in a recent report.

It is the design of Eld. Haskell and myself to help forward this T. and M. work this fall and winter as much as we can consistently with other duties. To this end, Eld. H. will hold meetings in all the western Conferences immediately after the close of our camp-meeting season. The readers of this will please notice an article from the pen of Eld. H. in this REVIEW in reference to general quarterly meetings. We wish our brethren in those Conferences to give the places where these meetings should be held, according to the time given in his article in season for each. As he cannot accomplish very much in holding the T. and M. Society unless he is present at these general quarterly meetings, we hope the officers of these societies will appoint all these in accordance with his suggestions. We notice an appointment in Iowa for a general quarterly meeting at Knoxville, Sept. 20, 21. In view of the importance of Bro. Haskell's presence and counsel, and the impossibility of his attending at that time, we take the liberty of taking up this appointment and putting it off till he can attend, so that the brethren can have the benefit of his experience. See appointment on last page. We want all our brethren to rally with us to push forward this work. We want them to hold all their district quarterly meetings in advance, so that their reports may be in season. The labors of Eld. H. last spring in the West were of great benefit. But then, the work just started. Now we want to take other important steps in the same direction so that these societies shall be in successful operation in all Conferences east of the Rocky Mountains this year. Brethren and sisters, let us all manifest our interest in pushing forward the good work. We can all become laborers together by enlisting heartily in the tract and missionary work. The autumn months are very favorable for holding these meetings. We trust there will be a general rally, and that great good will be done. GEO. I. BUTLER.

Important Meeting in Iowa.

By George I. Butler

Having been requested by leading brethren in Iowa to hold an important meeting in the western part of the State this fall for the benefit of many of our new churches who could not attend the camp-meeting, and especially for the purpose of forwarding the tract and missionary work, Eld. Haskell and myself have concluded to appoint a general meeting at Osceola, commencing Thursday and closing Monday, Oct. 9-13. This is designed to be a general meeting of all in the State who can reasonably attend it. We hope most of the leading brethren in the whole State will be present, including the ministers and licentiates as far as possible. Especially all the new churches should be well represented.

We want one of the large tents of the State to be on the ground, and many of the brethren should bring their church and private tents also, for the church there is small, and those who come, will have mainly to provide for themselves. The large tent can be pitched a little distance from the meeting-house, and should the weather be cold, we can heat up the meeting-house and hold meetings in it, and if plenty of bedding and straw is brought upon the ground, we can comfortably sleep in our tents. If the weather is warm, we can hold meetings in the large tent. Our only reason for appointing this meeting is an earnest desire to help the cause among those churches which have had but little labor. We therefore request a general turn-out, and we will help all we can. GEO. I. BUTLER.

Experiments.

By Joseph Clarke

NOTHING is more natural or common than for people to make experiments. This is all right, if confined to proper bounds. When science calls for proof of her principles, she often has recourse to experiments.

But in many cases this principle is carried to a strange excess. The youth is warned of evil company, or evil habits; but he is not satisfied until he tries them for himself; so he becomes a votary of the saloon or the gaming table, and tobacco and wine, or alcohol in some form, and dissipation follows, and ruin comes, as a matter of course. So Eve was not satisfied with what God had said, but would, for herself, try the forbidden fruit; and for this little experiment, we, as a race, suffer, have suffered, and continue to endure untold misery and sorrow.

Who would think of trying arsenic, and all the poisons of the apothecary, to see if they were really poison? Who would survive such a course of experiments? Neither should we try the paths of Satan and the world: our health would not stand the poisons of the druggist, nor will our spiritual interests bear the strain of experimenting with sin. God alone can guard us by his grace. Let us pray without ceasing for strength to resist evil.

Joseph Clarke.

Pious Gambling Excepted.

By M. E. Cornell

The policy of lying and cheating for God’s sake, so prevalent in the mother church, is becoming quite general among the daughters. Laws favoring their schemes are being enacted in different places. Games of chance are becoming so common in the socials, fairs, festivals, and donation parties, as no longer to occasion remark. The practice of games and gambling, no less than the pride, conformity to the world, and love of pleasure, marks with sad and fearful certainty the great body of the Protestant sects as a part of the fallen Babylon of the Apocalypse. When they can gamble by law, they may consider themselves safe so far as earthly tribunals are concerned.

The following speaks for itself:—

“SECTION 1. Be it ordained by the City Council of the City of Bloomington, Ill., That no person or persons shall hereafter within the city limits sell any lottery or gift enterprise ticket or tickets of any kind whatever, nor any prize package or packages containing or purporting to contain a prize or prizes of any kind whatever, nor sell or give in a drawing, a chance or pretended chance for the purchaser or receiver to draw a prize of any kind whatever, provided nothing in this ordinance shall prevent any society or organization using an election or other means to raise money for educational, charitable, or religious purposes.”

M. E. CORNELL.

True Repentance.

By A. S. H.

“TRUE repentance consists in the heart being broken for sin, and broken from sin. Some often repent, yet never reform; they resemble a man traveling a dangerous path, who frequently starts and stops, but never turns back.”—Exchange.

This is not the repentance which God enjoins upon the sinner. It is not the repentance which secures his favor, or life eternal: it is that which ends in death. Of the sinner it is expressly declared, “If he turn not from his way, shall die in his iniquity.”

How many will reject all the gracious offers of salvation, add sin to sin, and never fully repent. They will wade through the prayers and entreaties of dear friends, who feel a tender solicitude for their eternal welfare, down to death; though God has provided the most ample means for the removal of all sin, and would have them live. “I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked; but that the wicked turn from his way and live.” A. S. H.

River of Life.

By A. Smith

“AND he showed me a pure river of water of life.”

The turbid waters of the river that flows at my feet, as they gurgle by, murmur of a sin-cursed earth, groaning for the deliverance which can only be wrought by a divine hand. In the sedgy margin, serpents flee at the sound of my approaching steps; here and there the bare branches of dead trees are drawn in distinct outline against the dark foliage of the forest behind; while from the adjacent marsh are borne disease-freighted miasm and melancholy sounds.

River of life! In vision, I see thy transparent waters as they flow through the garden of God, in such marked contrast with the rivers of earth, that I long to be with the sinless ones, who, with holy angels, shall tread its beautiful margin, or bathe in its life-giving tide. A. Smith.

God's Goodness Greater Than Our Wants

THE greater your wants, the greater God’s goodness in supplying them; the greater your enemies, the greater the display of God’s power in subduing them; the greater your unworthiness, the greater his grace in saving you.

The Cause Is One.

By Roswell Fenner Cottrell

UNITY is a characteristic of the work of the Lord. Among the advocates of error, there is discord and confusion. For one unscriptural practice, as for example, the keeping of the first day of the week instead of the Sabbath, perhaps fifty different and conflicting reasons will be given. But ask any number of those who keep the seventh day why they do so, and you will get substantially the same answer from each. It is the will of Christ that his disciples should be one, even as the Father and the Son are one. John 17:20–22. That they “all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions” among them. 1 Cor. 1:10. This unity is not a characteristic of the professed Christians of the present day. They are wanting in respect to these divine credentials, which should recommend their faith to the world. Not only are they divided into separate churches of conflicting creeds, but the members of the same church are not agreed. This is true of professed Adventists who reject the Sabbath of the Lord and the third angel’s message. They are divided, not only in the reasons why and how Sunday should be regarded, but on many other points of great importance.

“And more confusion is their proper label, Than ever clustered round the tower of Babel.”

But unity characterizes the work in which we are engaged. You listen to a S. D. Adventist in Maine or Minnesota, Colorado or California, and you will hear the same thing, not only on one particular idea, but on all the great and important doctrines of the entire Bible. From every religious denomination, and from every nationality, a people are coming into “unity of faith.” The Lord is one. His work is in harmony with itself, and the fruit of it is unity.

But God works by means; and there is order in his work. The host which the Lord leads to do a specific work must not be an unorganized, undisciplined rabble. (Please read the second and the fourth chapters of Numbers.) Such an army could not be successful against its foes. There is order in Heaven. The “armies of Heaven” “are marshalled under their respective leaders by the “Lord of hosts.” And God has also designed that there should be order in the church on earth. To this end he has set certain gifts and offices in the church. And it must be evident to all that when the Lord intends to do a great and specific work, such as giving the last message to man, the last warning of probation, that he will make choice of certain ones to take the lead. This is in harmony with his doings in the past, as exemplified in his dealings with ancient Israel. And no one is better qualified to choose than God, who knows the hearts and qualifications of all. He will not make an unwise choice. It is evident that he would choose such as, all things considered, are best calculated to lead. We believe that he has done so. And yet it has been the business of unsanctified ones, while they profess to love the truth, to murmur and complain of the means by which God has sent it; and many, like Diotrephes, “who” as the apostle said, “loveth to have the pre-eminence” (3 John. 9), would depose and reject those whom God has chosen, as he of old withdrew fellowship from the beloved disciple and chosen apostle, and cast those out of the church who sympathized with those whom God had chosen.

The cause is one; and it will bring those that adhere to it into unity. God will stand by those he has chosen to lead, till he himself sets them aside. We do not claim infallibility for any man. All are liable to mistakes and errors. But the work of the Lord is sure of a harmonious accomplishment; and from fallen humanity God will make use of those means which are best calculated to fulfill his wise designs. He will use those who are humbly devoted to his work. All the consecrated and faithful will share in the work; but the glory shall be the Lord’s.

Let all who would have a part in the cause of God, humble and devote themselves to the work, “endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.” Let us not be like those who thank God for the truth, while they seek a quarrel with those through whom they received it, thus despising the very instrumentality which God has chosen, through which to benefit them. R. F. COTTRELL.

Their Strength Is to Sit Still

“THEIR STRENGTH IS TO SIT STILL.”—“You are in better hands than your own, if you will but be quiet,” said the judge to a prisoner who was not guilty, and who so stoutly asserted his innocence as to interrupt the proceedings of the court.

How often is the Christian under some afflictive dispensation, restless and struggling to extricate himself, forgetting that he, with all that concerns him, is in the Lord’s hands, and that he has said: “In quietness and in confidence shall be your strength!” (Isa. 30:15).—Messenger.

California Tent.

By Merritt E. Cornell

Twenty-five lectures have been given, up to the present, and the interest is yet rising. More than one hundred voted for the truth, and about forty have decided to keep the Sabbath. The first discourse on the nature of man was given last evening, and it has fanned the interest to a flame. We hear that not much else is talked on the streets to-day. The interest seems now to be extending into the country, and they come in from a distance of from three to eight miles. We are encouraged by what we already see, but the end is not yet. During the first week of our meetings, the St. Helena correspondent of the Napa Daily Register spoke very disparagingly of our prospects, but he seems now to have changed his mind. The following we clip from the Register of last week:—

“The Adventists, who have been here holding their tent meetings during the past ten days, are now attracting the general attention, and causing ‘the dry bones to shake.’ Eld. Cornell is nightly drawing large, attentive, orderly, and appreciative audiences, and is winning golden opinions both for his gentlemanly bearing and the masterly and intelligent manner in which he elucidates the subjects presented. One ‘hot-gospeler’ had the temerity to attack the Elder recently, and, failing to draw him into his rough, brow-beating, undignified style of discussion, straightened the lapels of his coat to the passing zephyrs and no longer intruded his presence upon an order-loving, dignified assemblage of St. Helena’s proverbially quiet and polite inhabitants. The peculiar tenets of these people may be wrong; but the advocates are entitled to respect no less for their self-sacrificing zeal and earnestness than their genial, gentlemanly deportment.”

Since then, Bro. Loughborough came up from Napa, and was with me over Sabbath and first-day, and gave a new impetus to the interest. He brought a good report of the work in Napa. Last Sabbath was the first meeting of the new friends there without a preacher. They had one hundred and fifteen in attendance, and they report a most cheering result.

Many of the new friends of truth, both here and at Napa, are looking forward to the camp-meeting with interest. It is to be just half way (nine miles) between the two places, and many of our hearers, who have not yet decided to keep the Sabbath, will attend the camp-meeting. Oh, how important that meeting! and what solemn responsibilities will rest upon all our people. Let every one turn away from every wrong and doubtful thing, and in a special manner seek God, and earnestly pray that we may share the divine favor and blessing at that time.

M. E. CORNELL.

St. Helena, Cal., Aug. 20, 1873.

TIME IS PASSING.

Time is running in his chariot, Rapidly his wheels go round; Though they leave no dust behind them, Though they have no rumbling sound; Silently they bear us onward, Soon our journey will be o'er, Soon our feet shall press the meadows Of the vast eternal shore.

Flying months and years remind us Of the world we're passing to; Let us leave good deeds behind us, In the world we're passing through, Which shall be the seeds of kindness, Watered by celestial dew, And shall bear good fruit for others— Fruits of joy, and peace, and love— Which shall lead to songs of triumph, In the immortal land above.

Men are born and men are dying, Thousands come, not one to stay; Time is swift, his wheels are flying, Never ceasing, night or day, For the laughter, nor the crying, For the stricken or the gay; Crushing down the God-defying— They who laugh at death's delay; And for sorrow, sin, and sighing, Bearing gentle souls away.

Plans and schemes of men and nations, Hearts and homes and homesteads free, Granite walls and art's creations, All the eye delights to see. All the ear delights in hearing, Crumble, tumble, fall and fade. Oh! we need a world more cheering, Free from graves and cypress shade. Thanks to God! that world we're nearing, In eternal sapphires laid.

D. T. BOURDEAU

By D. T. Bourdeau

Vermont.

Aside from attending to the repairs of my buildings at Burke, I have, since reporting last, attended the monthly meetings at Whitmore and East Charleston, organized Systematic Benevolence for the companies in these places to the amount of over $50.00 a year, held meetings occasionally at Burke, and attended our late camp-meeting at Wolcott. It was indeed refreshing to enjoy the labors of Elds. Butler and Haskell on this occasion. A good work was accomplished. But we regret that this meeting found so many of us on the back-ground, so that there was not that amount of good done for outsiders that might have been done. May we all remember our deep and solemn convictions of sin under the close preaching that we heard, and carry out our good resolutions now that we are called upon to meet the trials and duties of life at the various stations where the providence of God calls us.

D. T. BOURDEAU

Barton Landing, Vt., Aug. 18, 1873.

Wisconsin Church Visits and Baptisms, August 1873

By P. S. Thurston; John Atkinson

Wisconsin.

AUGUST 5, visited the Waterloo church, and preached three times; held prayer and social meetings, and a Tract and Missionary meeting.

Aug. 8, went to Mount Hope, Grant Co., to attend quarterly meeting. At this meeting, the ordinances were celebrated, with good effect. We remained here five days, holding, in all, twelve meetings. Nine discourses were given, mostly practical. Our prayer and social meetings were very interesting and profitable. We went nine miles, to the Wisconsin River, to baptize. Six willing souls were buried with Christ by baptism, whom we trust will walk in newness of life. We think this church is in a prosperous condition. May the Lord bless these dear brethren and sisters, and help them to walk humbly with their God.

Aug. 14, went to Sand Prairie, Richland Co., where one willing soul was baptized and two more added to the church. We remained here three days, holding, in all, nine meetings. This church, we believe, is advancing in spirituality. They have an efficient elder, which is very important for the prosperity of any church.

P. S. THURSTON, JOHN ATKINSON. Deerfield, Aug. 28, 1873.

Conquering Doubts on One's Knees

THERE are, as in philosophy, so in divinity, sturdy doubts and boisterous objections. More of these no man hath known than myself; which I confess I conquered, not in a martial posture, but on my knees.—Sir Thomas Browne.

My Mother's Fear.

My mother is a Scotch woman, but we have resided many years at the village of — in England. She is a true Christian without doubt; but she had, till lately, one peculiarity in her character, which kept her from being a happy Christian;—it was the fear of death; not the fear of being cast away at the last, but the dread of having to lie on a sick-bed, and to feel that death must soon lay his hand upon her. Her nature recoiled at the very thought of it, and kept her for many years from that happiness and peace which should be the attendant of a forgiven sinner.

She was in communion at the Lord’s table, and her Christian friends often tried to convince my dear mother that, as sure as God was true, so would her strength be equal to that day of death, as much as it ever was to any trial of her life. But it was all of no use; she knew God could be nothing else but faithful; but still her dread was the same, and kept her constantly unhappy. Others also tried to console her, and to draw her mind off the dreaded moment, but at length they all gave it up; it was useless. She used to stop them short with, “I tell you it will be dreadful, I know it will.”

Well, there came to our village one week-day, a gentleman who had been preaching in the neighborhood around, and he gave out that there would be preaching under the old oak by the wayside, at the corner of the road to —. I went, and was much struck by the simplicity with which he told the gospel story to his hearers, and while I listened, the thought struck me that the good man might be made useful to my mother. As soon as he had done, I went and asked him if he would come and see my mother, who was then an invalid, and could not leave her house. He said he would come then, and as we went along, I told him of my mother’s fear of death, and begged him if he could do anything to comfort her, to do it. My mother knew where I had gone, and as we entered, I said, “Mother, here is the gentleman I have been to hear, come to see you.”

“Glad to see you, sir,” said mother; “pray sit down.”

“My good woman,” said he, after a few casual remarks, “your son has told me how much you suffer from the fear of death.”

“O, pray, sir, don’t mention it. It was gone from my mind, and I dread the thought of its revival.”

“It is good and wholesome if unbelievers have a dread of death,” said our visitor, “but I trust you are a true believer.”

“Through God’s grace, I rejoice in hope of eternal life.”

Our visitor sat thinking a moment or two, and I was wondering what he would say next, for I had often heard others go over the ground of God’s faithfulness, and his promise to be with his people in every trial.

He broke silence, and said, “Well, my good sister, I know you cannot always control your own feelings, but does it not strike you as unwise to grieve over what may never happen.”

“Never happen, man!” said my mother, “what do you mean? In this life we are certain of nothing but death and the Judgment. It must come! It must come!”

“You believe God’s word, madam?” inquired the stranger.

“Most truly,” said my mother.

“Then listen to me,” and he turned to 1 Thess. 4: 16-18, and read, “The Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the Archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air; and so shall we ever be with the Lord. Wherefore comfort one another with these words.” And then turning to my mother, he said, “Are you sure you will not be one of those ‘who are alive and remain’ when Jesus comes? If not, you are not sure you will ever die at all.”

My mother was struck dumb! The passage was quite familiar to her, but it never occurred to her that she might possibly be one of those who will be alive at that day. Our visitor saw the truth had struck home, and bidding us farewell, he left, promising to call again the next time he came our way.

As soon as he had gone, my mother bade me get her large Bible and find the passage, and she sat and read it as one spell-bound. At last she said, as if talking to herself, “How strange it should follow with the words, ‘Comfort one another with these words.’” And then she repeated the passage, “Watch therefore, for ye know not at what hour your Lord doth come.” “Grieving over what may never happen! and all these years!” “Comfort one another with these words.”

Our visitor called again, but found his work was done; the simple truth had, under God’s blessing, brought forth fruit, and my mother dreads no more the fearful death, but keeps her eyes on the life, and earnestly joins in the prayer, “Come, Lord Jesus, come quickly.”—Sel.

Stewardship: Laying Up Treasure in Heaven

By George Müller

Stewardship.

In Matt. 6: 19–21, it is written: “Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal; but lay up for yourselves treasures in Heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal: for where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.” Observe, dear reader, the following points concerning this part of the divine testimony:—

1. It is the Lord Jesus, our Lord and Master, who speaks this as the Lawgiver of his people—he who has infinite wisdom and unfathomable love to us, who therefore both knows what is for our real welfare and happiness, and who cannot exact from us any requirement inconsistent with that love which led him to lay down his life for us.

2. His counsel, his affectionate entreaty, and his commandment to us his disciples is, “Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth.” The meaning obviously is, that the disciples of the Lord Jesus, being strangers and pilgrims on earth, i. e., neither belonging to the earth nor expecting to remain in it, should not seek to increase their earthly possessions, in whatever these possessions may consist. This is a word for poor believers as well as for rich believers; it has as much a reference to putting shillings into the savings-bank as to putting thousands of pounds into the funds, or purchasing one house or one farm after another. It may be said, But does not every prudent and provident person seek to increase his means, that he may have a goodly portion to leave to his children, or to have something for old age, or for the time of sickness, etc.? My reply is, It is quite true that this is the custom of the world. But whilst thus it is in the world, and we have every reason to believe ever will be so among those that are of the world, and who therefore have their portion on earth, we, disciples of the Lord Jesus, being born again, being the children of God, not nominally, but really, being truly partakers of the divine nature, being in fellowship with the Father and the Son, and having in prospect “an inheritance, incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away” (1 Pet. 1: 4), ought, in every respect, to act differently from the world, and so in this particular also. If we, disciples of the Lord Jesus, seek, like the people of the world, after an increase of our possessions, may not those who are of the world justly question whether we believe what we say when we speak about our inheritance, our heavenly calling, our being the children of God, etc.? Often it must be a sad stumbling-block to the unbeliever to see a professed believer in the Lord Jesus acting in this particular just like himself. Consider this, dear brethren in the Lord, should this remark apply to you.

3. Our Lord says about the earth that it is a place “where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal.” All that is of the earth, and in any way connected with it, is subject to corruption, to change, to dissolution. There is no reality, or substance, in anything else but in heavenly things. Often the careful amassing of earthly possessions ends in losing them in a moment by fire, by robbery, by a change of mercantile concerns, by loss of work, etc.; but suppose all this were not the case, still, yet a little while, and thy soul shall be required of thee; or, yet a little while, and the Lord Jesus will return; and what profit shalt thou then have, dear reader, if thou hast carefully sought to increase thy earthly possessions?

4. Our Lord, however, does not merely bid us not to lay up treasure upon earth; for if he had said no more, this his commandment might be abused, and persons might find in it an encouragement for their extravagant habits, for their love of pleasure, for their habit of spending everything they have, or can obtain, upon themselves. It does not mean, then, as is the common phrase, that we should “live up to our income;” for he adds, “But lay up for yourselves treasures in Heaven.” There is such a thing as laying up as truly in Heaven as there is laying up on earth; if it were not so, our Lord would not have said so. Just as persons put one sum after another into the bank, and it is put down to their credit, and they may use the money afterward, so truly the penny, the shilling, the pound, the hundred pounds, the ten thousand pounds, given for the Lord’s sake, and constrained by the love of Jesus, to poor brethren, or in any way spent in the work of God, he marks down in the book of remembrance, he considers as laid up in Heaven. The money is not lost; it is laid up in the bank of Heaven; yet so, that whilst an earthly bank may break, or through earthly circumstances we may lose our earthly possessions, the money which is thus secured in Heaven cannot be lost.—From Muller’s Life of Trust.

Annual Meeting of the N. Y. and Pa. Tract and Missionary Society.

By P. Z. Kinne; B. L. Whitney

THE second annual meeting of the N. Y. and Pa. T. and M. Society was held on the camp-ground at Kirkville, Aug. 10, 1873. Meeting was called to order by the President. Minutes of the last meeting read and accepted. The report of the secretary for the year was then presented as follows:—

No. of members received during the year, 74; whole No. of members, 543; No. of families visited, 2960.

No. of new subscribers obtained for REVIEW, 352; Reformer, 350; Instructor, 465. No. of REVIEWS distributed, 2271; Reformers, 1042; Instructors, 624. No. pages pamphlets and tracts distributed, 519,252.

Money received during the year:— On membership, $74.00; “ Donations, 209.39; “ Book Sales, 79.97; “ Delinquent Fund, 389.76; “ Widow and Orphan’s Fund, 71.14; “ Hygienic Book Fund, 789.20.

Total, $1613.46. Business on periodicals through the society, $219.48.

The reading of the report was followed by remarks by Brn. Butler and Haskell, and interesting comparisons of the present report with that of the first year, by Bro. Haskell.

The following officers were then elected for the ensuing year:—

President, P. Z. Kinne; Vice President, J. M. Lindsay; Secretary, B. L. Whitney; Treasurer, Nettie F. Holt.

Directors: Dist. No. 1, T. H. Lindsay; No. 2, Daniel Bowe; No. 3, S. N. Walsworth; No. 4, A. H. Hall; No. 5, Isaac N. Russell; No. 6, M. S. Tyrell; No. 7, W. E. Stillman; No. 8, E. S. Lane; No. 9, John Lindsey; No. 10, Wm. Coats; No. 11, D. B. Welch.

By vote of the society, Hamilton Co., N. Y., was added to Dist. No. 6.

P. Z. KINNE, Pres.

B. L. WHITNEY, Sec.

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